react-live

What is react-live?

react-live is a React component that enables you to render live, editable code samples in your application. It provides a live code editor and preview, making it ideal for documentation, tutorials, and interactive coding environments.

What are react-live's main functionalities?

Live Code Editing

This feature allows users to edit code in a live editor and see the results immediately. The LiveProvider component wraps the code, and LiveEditor, LiveError, and LivePreview components handle the editing, error display, and preview respectively.

import { LiveProvider, LiveEditor, LiveError, LivePreview } from 'react-live';

const code = `<strong>Hello World!</strong>`;

function App() {
  return (
    <LiveProvider code={code}>
      <LiveEditor />
      <LiveError />
      <LivePreview />
    </LiveProvider>
  );
}

export default App;

Custom Scope

This feature allows you to provide custom components and variables to the live code editor. By passing a scope object to the LiveProvider, you can use external components and libraries in the live code.

import { LiveProvider, LiveEditor, LiveError, LivePreview } from 'react-live';
import { Button } from 'my-ui-library';

const code = `<Button>Click me</Button>`;

const scope = { Button };

function App() {
  return (
    <LiveProvider code={code} scope={scope}>
      <LiveEditor />
      <LiveError />
      <LivePreview />
    </LiveProvider>
  );
}

export default App;

Theming

This feature allows you to apply custom themes to the live code editor. By passing a theme object to the LiveProvider, you can style the code editor to match your application's design.

import { LiveProvider, LiveEditor, LiveError, LivePreview } from 'react-live';
import { dracula } from 'react-syntax-highlighter/dist/esm/styles/prism';

const code = `<strong>Hello World!</strong>`;

function App() {
  return (
    <LiveProvider code={code} theme={dracula}>
      <LiveEditor />
      <LiveError />
      <LivePreview />
    </LiveProvider>
  );
}

export default App;

Other packages similar to react-live

react-syntax-highlighter

react-syntax-highlighter is a syntax highlighting component for React using Prism or Highlight.js. Unlike react-live, it does not provide live editing or preview capabilities but focuses on syntax highlighting for static code snippets.

react-codemirror2

react-codemirror2 is a React component for CodeMirror, a versatile text editor implemented in JavaScript. It provides a rich code editing experience but does not include live preview functionality out of the box like react-live.

react-ace

react-ace is a React component for the Ace editor. It offers a powerful code editing experience with various features like syntax highlighting, themes, and keybindings. However, it does not provide live code preview capabilities like react-live.

README

React Live

A production-focused playground for live editing React code

React Live brings you the ability to render React components with editable source code and live preview. It supports server-side rendering and comes in a tiny bundle.

The library is structured modularly and lets you style and compose its components freely.

Usage

Install it with npm install react-live or yarn add react-live and try out this piece of JSX:

import {
  LiveProvider,
  LiveEditor,
  LiveError,
  LivePreview
} from 'react-live'

<LiveProvider code="<strong>Hello World!</strong>">
  <LiveEditor />
  <LiveError />
  <LivePreview />
</LiveProvider>

Demo

https://react-live.kitten.sh/

FAQ

How does it work?

It takes your code and transpiles it with Bublé, while the code is displayed using react-simple-code-editor and the code is highlighted using prism-react-renderer.

The transpiled code is then rendered in the preview component (LivePreview), which does a fake mount if the code is a React component.

What code can I use?

The code can be one of the following things:

• React elements, e.g. <strong>Hello World!</strong>
• React pure functional components, e.g. () => <strong>Hello World!</strong>
• React component classes

If you enable the noInline prop on your LiveProvider, you’ll be able to write imperative code, and render one of the above things by calling render.

How does the scope work?

The scope prop on the LiveProvider accepts additional globals. By default it injects React only, which means that the user can use it in their code like this:

//                    ↓↓↓↓↓
class Example extends React.Component {
  render() {
    return <strong>Hello World!</strong>
  }
}

But you can of course pass more things to the scope. They will be available as variables in the code. Here's an example using styled components:

import styled from 'styled-components';

const headerProps = { text: 'I\'m styled!' };

const scope = {styled, headerProps};

const code = `
  const Header = styled.div\`
    color: palevioletred;
    font-size: 18px;
  \`

  render(<Header>{headerProps.text}</Header>)
`

<LiveProvider code={code} scope={scope} noInline={true}>
  <LiveEditor />
  <LiveError />
  <LivePreview />
</LiveProvider>

API

<LiveProvider />

This component provides the context for all the other ones. It also transpiles the user’s code! It supports these props, while passing any others through to the children:

Name	PropType	Description
code	PropTypes.string	The code that should be rendered, apart from the user’s edits
scope	PropTypes.object	Accepts custom globals that the code can use
noInline	PropTypes.bool	Doesn’t evaluate and mount the inline code (Default: false)
transformCode	PropTypes.func	Accepts and returns the code to be transpiled, affording an opportunity to first transform it
language	PropTypes.string	What language you're writing for correct syntax highlighting. (Default: jsx)
disabled	PropTypes.bool	Disable editing on the <LiveEditor /> (Default: false)
theme	PropTypes.object	A prism-react-renderer theme object. See more here

All subsequent components must be rendered inside a provider, since they communicate using one.

The noInline option kicks the Provider into a different mode, where you can write imperative-style code and nothing gets evaluated and mounted automatically. Your example will need to call render with valid JSX elements.

<LiveEditor />

This component renders the editor that displays the code. It is a wrapper around react-simple-code-editor and the code highlighted using prism-react-renderer.

<LiveError />

This component renders any error that occur while executing the code, or transpiling it. It passes through any props to a pre.

Note: Right now when the component unmounts, when there’s no error to be shown.

<LivePreview />

This component renders the actual component that the code generates inside an error boundary.

Name	PropType	Description
Component	PropTypes.node	Element that wraps the generated code. (Default: div)

withLive

The withLive method creates a higher-order component, that injects the live-editing props provided by LiveProvider into a component.

Using this HOC allows you to add new components to react-live, or replace the default ones, with a new desired behavior.

The component wrapped with withLive gets injected the following props:

Name	Type	Description
code	string	Reflects the code that is passed in as the code prop
error	string	An error that the code has thrown when it was previewed
onError	function	A callback that, when called, changes the error to what's passed as the first argument
onChange	function	A callback that accepts new code and transpiles it
element	React.Element	The result of the transpiled code that is previewed

Note: The code prop doesn't reflect the up-to-date code, but the code prop, that is passed to the LiveProvider.

FAQ

I want to use experimental feature x but Bublé doesn't support it! Can I use babel instead?

react-live doesn't currently support configuring the transpiler and it ships with Bublé. The current workaround for using some experimental features bublé doesn't support would be to use the transformCode prop on LiveProvider to transform your code with babel alongside bublé.

Here is a minimal example on how you could use babel to support class-properties in react-live:

Comparison to component-playground

There are multiple options when it comes to live, editable React component environments. Formidable actually has two first class projects to help you out: component-playground and react-live. Let's briefly look at the libraries, use cases, and factors that might help in deciding which is right for you.

Here's a high-level decision tree:

• If you want fast and easy setup and integration, then component-playground may be the ticket!
• If you want a smaller bundle, SSR, and more flexibility, then react-live is for you!

Here are the various factors at play:

• Build: component-playground uses babel-standalone, react-live uses bublé. (Note: react-live might make transpiler customizable in the future).
• Bundle size: component-playground has a larger bundle, but uses a more familiar editor setup. react-live is smaller, but more customized editor around prism.
• Ease vs. flexibility: react-live is more modular/customizable, while component-playground is easier/faster to set up.
• SSR: component-playground is not server-side renderable, react-live is.
• Extra features: component-playground supports raw evaluation and pretty-printed output out-of-the-box, while react-live does not.
• Error handling: component-playground might have more predictable error handling than react-live in some cases (due to react-dom, although this might change with React 16).